


Wail

by Katharos



Category: Hikaru no Go
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-24
Updated: 2009-12-24
Packaged: 2017-10-05 04:13:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 494
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/37690
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Katharos/pseuds/Katharos
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Go tutor to the Emperor, Sai's rival, draws near then end of his life. Poem included at the end of the fic.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wail

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [](http://sarasusa.livejournal.com/profile)[**sarasusa**](http://sarasusa.livejournal.com/) for fic_on_demand, who wanted something inspire by one of Dorothy Parker's poems.

Summary: The Go tutor to the Emperor, Sai's rival, draws near then end of his life. Poem included at the end of the fic.

  
The night is cold, winter reaching slyly out to steal one of autumn's days before its due. It sinks into his hands and he fumbles the stones as he pulls them from the go ke and places them on the board. The full sound of the stones on wood is flawed, but they still echo off the walls of the empty room, unperturbed by the thin screens.

_pachi_ they wail under his fingers, in the air, in his bones, _pachi_.

He can remember when his quarters were full of retainers, can remember when his quarters lay near the bright centre of the Court and he, too, was one of the few privileged to see the Emperor in his glory. To be near him, to sit with him, to exchange words and stones and _influence_ with him. The stones gave him power, and he doesn't need their love anymore.

_pachi_ cry the stones, _pachi_.

The number of his retainers has dwindled over the years; first one, then two, then more and more until finally this night he has sent the few that remains away. Once he carried his marks of status about him proudly and plainly, but they have fallen away from him one by one. Yet still he sits, listening to the walls give back the sounds of his stones.

_pachi_ they sob, _pachi_

His breathing is harsh and very loud in the quiet of the room. Almost it seems apart from him, someone else, a constant companion in dark corners when he has hated and fought all his life to be singular. Complete within himself, neither borrowing nor lending, with no one to obscure his light. Yet sometimes he almost imagines that he hears the rustle of cloth behind it, the sigh of long hair, but when he holds his breath, his hand frozen trembling above the board, still clutching the stone and strains to hear, there is nothing but the silence.

_pachi_

The Retired Emperor sent him a poem today. It was of a game under autumn trees, when great gold leaves drifted down to settle upon the white and black of the Go board; a game he had witnessed, unseen, as he crushed a brittle leaf to powder in his hand. He hasn't replied yet. He doesn't know how.

_pachi_ _pachi_ _pachi_

The game spirals down into endgame, he is a masterful opponent, and from the traps he has laid there is no way out.

 

Wail

Love has gone a-rocketing,  
That is not the worst;  
I could do without the thing,  
And not be the first.

Joy has gone the way it came.  
That is nothing new;  
I could get along the same,  
Many people do.

Dig for me the narrow bed,  
Now I am bereft.  
All my pretty hates are dead,  
And what have I left?


End file.
